How to make your own custom heat transfers

Hello! Welcome!

If you're beginning your t-shirt business journey then you have come to the right place! We are so ready to help and guide you on this journey. If you didn't already know, all our social media and our Youtube channel is filled to the brim with handy heat printing tutorials that will help you reach an expert level in no time.

But enough of that, let's learn to make your own custom heat transfers.

If you were dreading the thought of having to buy loads of expensive papers and printers, then we're here to tell you to stop worrying.

You don't need to spend a penny on equipment.

Heat Transfer artwork:

You don't need fancy software with crazy creation skills to be able to obtain artwork for your transfers.

If you know how to create a vector from scratch on software like Adobe Illustrator, then by all means do that. This method is fully scalable and can be manipulated as you wish and saved in the best quality possible.

But don't fear, there still some great options out there that don't include creating the design yourself.

You can purchase premade vector designs from companies such as Etsy, Vecteezy or Shutterstock (plenty more websites available) for a small fee or why not check out the stock of designs that image websites like Canva have to offer? They often offer a free membership to get you started too.

If you're going down the route of personalised memoir style tshirts, a good quality digital photo will work too!

All we need is a good-quality file with a clear empty background.

Applicable file types include .eps .png or .pdf for this.

Print the heat transfers:

While there are many amateur products out there that enable a person to print heat transfers at home with supermarket paper and a printer, this method of garment decorating is extremely unreliable.

Without rigorous industry testing, you will not be able to ensure those transfers are of a quality that will last and last and last for your clients. Even without the worry of quality and the years of perfecting recipes and ingredients, printing transfers at home is costly. You will need to paper, ink, powders, printers and many more expertise level products.

Your best option for making your own heat transfers?

Order them online.

Stahls UK (Target Transfers) are the #1 Custom Heat Transfer manufacturer in the UK. They are the home of Stahls' Hotronix who have been manufacturing heat presses and heat transfer vinyl for over 40 years. They offer 3 different types of transfers.

1-5 Colour Screen Printed heat transfers

1-5 Colour Screen Printed heat transfers are most cost effective when working with designs that up 1 or 2 colours in them. They are for simple ideas and replicate the traditional screen printed finish without the hours of actual screen printing.

UltraColour heat transfers

UltraColour heat transfers are the most cost efficient heat transfer when ordering over 10 sheets. With photorealistic finishes and the ability to print endless colours and gradients, the transfer type is a great option for starting a tshirt brand.

UltraColour Max heat transfers

UltraColour Max heat transfers offer all the above qualities of UltraColour but with the minimum requirement of order just 1 sheet. This product also offers a jumbo size so you can cram all your designs onto one sheet and not have to worry about paying for over 10.

Upload online and wait for them to arrive.

Once you've chosen your heat transfer type, upload your design to our EasyView uploader platform. This space enables you to resize your designs, create some from scratch from the stock library and with the text tool and also arrange your designs into a gang sheet.

Place your order and it will arrive to your doorstep within a few days.

Simple as that. You've made your own custom heat transfers.

For the best way to apply these heat transfers, we recommend using a quality heat press like a Hotronix, where you can control your time, temperature and pressure.